Latest Surfs...

[BaNZ]

Some good surf in Taiwan at the moment from the typhoon. Voted best swell of the year.

edit: Photos from FB and are not mine.

[oldmansurfer]

In the top photo you can see two surfers off to the right. Looks like they are going to get bashed pretty good, looks light right about where the lip comes down and you can't duck dive that one or rather you can but most likely you will get hit really hard and won't be able to hang on to your board. If that was Kauai there would be at least 50 guys out maybe 150 if it was a commonly good break.

[BaNZ]

Looks like they are going to get bashed pretty good,

You learn something every day, I thought being able to duck dive means you never have to worry about your position as you can just dive deep and get pass it. As you can probably tell that I can't duck dive.

This is one of the most well known surf spot in Taiwan. Luckily it doesn't have many surfers, mostly locals. 50 would usually be the most. Everyone knows each other and have good etiquette apart from the tourists.

[dtc]

Yeah a wave that size will probably have a lip that will go several feet under the water when it hits. Also it weights A LOT; it's probably one of the most common cause of broken bones- having a big lip smash you between the wave and the board. Anyway, it's hard to duck dive that deep for that long

They look nice waves, too big for me though.

[CheaterFiveSurfBum]

Last 4 days glassy, overhead hurricane waves in our town. Some huge scary sets sometimes. Been offshore light wind everyday. Should continue for next 3 or 4 days. Cocoa beach florida, Hurricane Joaquin. Water is very warm 83 degrees F. Plenty of men in the grey suits. Our whole town is buzzin. Pure stoke. It should hit England eventually on it's projected path so our brothers in England need to wax up their sticks and call in sick.

[oldmansurfer]

I took my 9'6" board out yesterday because the waves looked like they would be difficult to catch. The 9'6" fungun catches waves well before they break but consequently doesn't have much speed when I reach the bottom so makes it hard to jam a bottom turn. I hadn't surfed that board in a while and think I will let it sit till there are some sizeable waves.
Went out today with my 8' board and rode the middle Horner's (reef) break. It was fun overhead but inconsistent and I was outnumbered by women in the break (2 women and me). The older woman I have met before and now finally asked her name and it turns out she works at the same pharmacy my wife goes to. She was riding a shortboard and having trouble catching waves. The other woman was younger than us oldies and riding a longboard and she was charging. I think she wanted to go outside and I would have accompanied her outside if not for my time limit being half used up by the time she got out there.

[oldmansurfer]

Went out this weekend, small waves, managed to get a shoulder tubed yesterday

[IanCaio]

Had some surf session this sunday, at least enough to keep me cool until next time (yet less than I really wanted).

It was about 2ft-3ft (maybe 3ft on bigger series), but the water was choppy.
I'm training swimming, trying to work myself up to bigger surf, and I feel I've improved a lot on swimming, but after this day I felt I still have a long way until I'm ready to what I'm aiming. I felt my cardio improved, even though I got a little tired on the first paddle out (the waves had no gusts, one after another, and at some point I almost lost my shorts, but I'll explain that part later ). But my duckdive still doesn't give me confidence for the big hollow waves I'll face in the future, I'm feeling some drag that I'm not sure if it's supposed to happen or if I'm just going too shallow. When I watch others duckdive, they don't seem to go that deeper than me, their legs are usually still outside of the water when the wave hits them. Maybe I'm doing it right, and on bigger waves you just need to hold tight and take the big drag..

Anyways, to the surfing itself. I had a couple waves, nothing exceptional. Liked one in particular: dropped in, big radius powerful (or powerful on my opinion ) bottom turn, section closing, so I just tried to hit the white wash, and I managed to keep on balance. So it was sort of a snap on the white water (wanted to see it from others perspective, to see if it looked cool as it felt).
About 2 waves didn't work good because of bad foot positioning on the pop up: front foot a little ahead. There was this one where I wiped out a little badly. I poped up, but my foot was ahead so I didn't have enough pressure for the bottom turn. In the middle of the turn I lost balance and went face first on water (luckily away from the board).

About the shorts, I almost had to take a bus on my underwear, since I wore the worst shorts I have for surfing! They are buttons ones, and while I was in the impact zone I realized they were already on my knees . Had to bail my board, take some waves to the head while trying to put my shorts back on. People on the beach probably thought I was drowning

[oldmansurfer]

This weekend was small waves breaking all over the place. I swear there must have been about 10 different swells coming in all small waist high waves or smaller. Yesterday I surfed alone and managed to get a nice backside cutback on one wave. Today I surfed in the same area as a few other surfers although the waves I was trying to catch were not waves that anyone else was trying to catch.... they were breaking all over the place. Yesterday I cut my surf session short because I saw fish jumping out of the water just outside of me and what I thought was probably a giant trevally fin sticking out of the water although it may have been a small shark I figured with that much activity there may be even more and not wanting to be a part of predator prey situations I left.

[Big H]

Had a quiet surf day before yesterday on an unpopular peak that happened to be working so I went to it....there was a group of german tourists (3), a father and son from what sounded from their accents like Germany, and one older gentleman on a foamie longboard and one of those surfing baseball hats with the flaps in the back and webbed surf gloves that bore an uncanny resemblance to a photo I've seen of Jaffa....the current was really up and there was major water movement longshore and going out to sea.....kept getting pulled into rips and spent half the sesh paddling out of them and back to the lineup.... was difficult to do much of anything....I saw the jet ski with the rescue pallet dragging behind it going out and back down the beach several times....called it after an hour and what seemed like 5000m of paddling....

[drowningbitbybit]

First surf in five weeks... FIVE WEEKS!!!!

I moved house, then my mum arrived for a 3-week stay, then I had a studio to build. Anyway, no surfing for FIVE WEEKS!!!

Took my big ol' 6'10 out to my local beachie just to reacquaint myself with the water. The conditions were pretty good - clean and about 2ft, and with my lack of surf fitness, I wouldn't have wanted it any bigger.

The mind still had it, but the lardy body wasn't really up to the job

Caught half a dozen though, so still an okay session despite the asthmatic wheezing and aching muscles

[dtc]

Dont you hate it when life gets in the way!

[jaffa1949]

Had a quiet surf day before yesterday on an unpopular peak that happened to be working so I went to it....one older gentleman on longboard and one of those surfing baseball hats with the flaps in the back and webbed surf gloves that bore an uncanny resemblance to a photo I've seen of Jaffa.....

Twen't me I was on the lake in front of my house in a canoe with my wife.
Here is the identifying photo to prove it wasn't me.
Older yes, gentleman, maybe, cap yep, no flaps though, paddle gloves yep, expanded plimsol line ( no surf since I got back)!!!

[oldmansurfer]

I didn't get to surf yesterday due to work but got out today. Horners and Black Rock were breaking and Makaiwa's which is about 0.75 miles out but it was tubing and good sized. I chose Horners and caught an inside wave that came in while I was paddling out then went to the outside break. It was a little bit spooky because there are a group of rocks called Horner's rock which are normally out of the water but today for most of the time they were covered up due to the tide, which made it difficult to keep track of them and made me worry excessively LOL anyway it was overhead and I caught a couple waves then went to try the middle break because it breaks to the side of the rocks but there was a current and the takeoff was really close to the hidden mostly rocks so I used up my time and paddled back to the car to get some exercise (maybe 100 yards over). Talked to a fellow old surfer who told me about a different technique to duck dive a wave that breaks in deeper water. He swims down to the bottom finds a bump in the reef that he can put his foot under and then locks his foot in there and pulls the board down to him with the cord then grabs the reef with his other hand. I don't recommend this for shallow reef breaks.

[Big H]

Had a quiet surf day before yesterday on an unpopular peak that happened to be working so I went to it....one older gentleman on longboard and one of those surfing baseball hats with the flaps in the back and webbed surf gloves that bore an uncanny resemblance to a photo I've seen of Jaffa.....

Twern't me, I was on the lake in front of my house in a canoe with my wife.
Here is the identifying photo to prove it wasn't me.
Older yes, gentleman, maybe, cap yep, no flaps though, paddle gloves yep, expanded plimsol line ( no surf since I got back)!!!

image.jpg

I wish I'd had a camera in the lineup....he had the hat (long flaps in the back covering the neck), gloves, long sleeve rasher (black though) and distinguished silver moustache....he could barrely ride a foamie though and rode straight when he did, nothing like the skills in that photo. Really uncanny though...............do you have a brother!?!?

[Big H]

Surfed today....took the longboard that I'd just installed a longboard traction pad to and tested it out in 4-6ft faces at Kuta beach...should have done this ages ago apparently, having a tactile target for my rear foot helped me get back far enough to get more play on the board and confidence to stomp down harder knowing I was in the right spot....consequently I was able to get at the wave more than usual and did a move I'd never done before... a floater re-entry off a closing section....I threw my hands in the air and stomped down and twisted hard like doing a 180* turn off the top of a skateboard vert ramp....board took it's time coming around but when it did I was on a cushion of whitewater....rode the wave just long enough to prove to myself that i'd stuck the landing so to speak then kicked out. Stoked....things are opening up now that I've figured out how to turn the board as I'm standing...the more I work on it the quicker the move gets and the more control (less surprised I am that it's working maybe) I have with the move....it gets a little better each time I'm out which means I can get down the line just that much faster. I'm working on that first pump when you stand up now, stand, pump up then get down....good times!

[oldmansurfer]

My theory of learning to surf is that at first you just have to grind out the hours in the surf learning basics how to paddle and where and when to paddle and how to popup etc. Then you kind of cruise along till you get something and suddenly the fun increase but then you have to grind out the hours perfecting that move. Look out everyone I will likely be posting gopro pics soon

[jaffa1949]

I wish I'd had a camera in the lineup....he had the hat (long flaps in the back covering the neck), gloves, long sleeve rasher (black though) and distinguished silver moustache....he could barrely ride a foamie though and rode straight when he did, nothing like the skills in that photo. Really uncanny though...............do you have a brother!?!?

No sorry, I was an only child and now I'm an orphan, my mother died some years back still hoping I'd grow up and out of the surfing craze.
Just old and average in my surfing

[jaffa1949]

The surf gods, stars and planets aligned A dawn patrol at my local noone out the first pulse of a swell hitting , wind offshore , light and grooming, water finally warm 6 out by the time I paddled out . All known friends, a sharing caring hooting group event in progress. Surfed well all knees and shoulders were in full attendance and long rides were had .
The coffee was hot at the kiosk after.
RESTORED, my faith in my own ability to enjoy a surf .

[HurdyGurdyManOnAWave]

Manresa beach, Santa Cruz, CA. ...surfed it at sunset. until almost night time. i had an eerie feeling, so i stayed in the middle and didnt go all the way out back, so any waves i did catch had to be short or i would run the risk of riding through the sand. It's Sharktober and the beaches in Santa Cruz are swarming with great whites!! after i looked up more about the beach on google, i learned that there was a shark attack there and hundreds of sightings in the past year. haha.

the feeling was eerie! waves were crumbly and not very powerful, in the mid-section, out in the back was the same, nice gradient/crumbly waves, only larger, didnt get to ride any. there was also a sandbar.